"I saw Jesus getting beaten," Cutairra said yesterday. "Needles were going in his arms. It was scary the way they was beating him."

She added: "It made me feel really bad, terrible."

After about 15 minutes of watching the R-rated film about the final hours of Jesus's life, Cutairra said she walked out of the room.

She was one of the 16 to 20 students who were shown the movie Tuesday at the public school, which is in the Congress Park neighborhood of Southeast Washington. D.C. school officials, who said sixth-graders should not be shown R-rated movies at school, have placed the teacher, Ronald Anthony, on leave with pay pending an investigation.

Among the issues that school system investigators say they are looking into is how Anthony obtained a copy of the movie, which has not been released on videotape or DVD.